Never a True Word by Michael McGuire

Author:Michael McGuire
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: book, FHP, FIC037000
ISBN: 9781743054840
Publisher: Wakefield Press
Published: 2017-03-29T04:00:00+00:00

27

It takes a while to settle back into the routine of normal life. I have become so used to checking the street for journos every morning that it’s some time before I wake without that feeling of paranoia chipping away at the edge of my brain. I had stumbled back into my house, never so grateful to see the two people in my life. I held Emily for a long time and sat on the couch holding Lily for most of the night as I gave my wife the rundown on everything that happened, while she tells me the equally harrowing story of three weeks as a single parent looking after a child with croup. Funnily enough the two experiences are quite similar.

At one point she laughs. ‘What?’ I protest.

‘Nothing. But you have always loved your trips. The business class, the fancy hotels and free dinners. You do love your luxuries. For a bloke who likes to think of himself as one of the people, you do have five-star tastes. Well, as long as someone else is paying I suppose.’

I start to argue, but realise she’s right. ‘Public transport and gruel for me from now on.’

  

At the office Harry and I try to explain to the others the sheer awfulness of the trip. They just think it’s hysterical and we have to admit some of it was so bizarre that there wasn’t much else to do but laugh. Their amusement is partly the relief it wasn’t them trying to keep Sloan in check and dealing with his daily madness. I manage to puncture their good humour by pointing out that Harry and I have now done our duty and the next trip will be theirs to take. You can see a little shiver of fear ripple its way across Bob’s face as he contemplates his fate.

Eventually we have to face the media. We do it on the second day back in the country. Chalmers has pestered me at least five times in the last forty-eight hours to get the exclusive with Ray. This, I decide, is a bad idea. Not because we can dodge the media forever, we clearly can’t, but because by giving the yarn to Chalmers we will incur the wrath of the rest of the media flock. After the circus of the last few weeks, I don’t want to contemplate what the national daily will do to Sloan if we cut them out again. There are times when it suits us to give exclusives. It can be easier to control the flow of information, the questions are generally gentler, and the journo seems to think they owe you one, which can come in handy.

We tend to share exclusives about. Feeding the same reporter or the same organisation time and again only breeds resentment from the others. In this case, if we give Sloan up to Chalmers it would rip away whatever modicum of sympathy the rest of the reporters may have for my boss. If

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.